


Let The Frost Melt Away

by XtaticPearl



Series: The Parker-Stark-Rhodes-Hogan-Potts-Danvers Family [5]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Asexual Tony Stark, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-30
Updated: 2016-12-30
Packaged: 2018-09-13 08:55:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9115960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XtaticPearl/pseuds/XtaticPearl
Summary: Tony finally feels comfortable enough to say something to his friends. Something that changes everything and nothing.





	

Tony decided to do it on a Friday evening.

He could see Vision lighting _Shabbat_  candles, a routine the synthezoid had learnt and imbibed from a missing friend and Avenger. The others had stumbled upon Vision following Wanda’s beliefs during the previous December, when he had quietly asked what they would be doing for Hannukah even as everyone was preparing for Christmas. It had sent Steve on a quiet guilt trip of forgetting to ask the young Sokovian woman and a collective effort to share the holidays in an inclusive spread of joy. 

There was not much joy now in the quiet air of the Avengers Compound. It was cold, like the lingering frost of a dying winter’s night. Yet, it was calm, in a way that spoke more of composure than contentment. Rhodey was sitting across Tony, a stylus twirling lazily around the fingers of one hand while the other held an older StarkPad, dark eyes reading through the latest news from his ex-colleagues. Carol was sitting beside Rhodey, leaning against his shoulder with her legs swinging over the arm of the couch, eyes closed and humming an off-key tune. Peter would be due in about an hour or so, his extra classes at school delaying him for the team get together as usual. 

This was his team now, Tony observed as he watched his friends move around him in their own worlds, comfort dripping with every relaxed moment. This was his family, he corrected, as he watched Vision close his eyes in front of the newly lit candles. They were at ease here, in their space. Safe. Comfortable.

In that moment of comfort and safety, Tony decided to do it.

“Hey Rhodes?”

“Hmmm?” Rhodey hummed, not taking his eyes off his pad, one hand now running slow fingers through Carol’s spikes.

“Remember the freshers’ party we first met in?” Tony asked.

“The one where you puked all over me? Yeah Tones,” Rhodey replied with a small chuckle that had Carol quirking a grin too. Tony nodded and took a breath.

“Remember how I tried to get you to sleep with me?”

Carol opened her eyes first and cut a curious look in Tony’s direction. Rhodey tilted his head a bit but didn’t react more than that.

“Mmhmm”

“I, uh,” Tony cleared his throat, “I never wanted to do that.”

Rhodey looked up now and eyed Tony curiously.

“Okay?”

“No, I - uh. I never wanted to sleep with you,” Tony clarified, feeling a bit of nervousness creep in but pushed through because he wanted to get it out, “I kind of _never_ wanted to sleep with you. Or anyone.”

Carol stopped swinging her legs and Tony tried to ignore it, but felt it as though somebody had stopped time altogether. He watched Rhodey’s fingers stop twirling the stylus. He heard Vision’s footsteps come around from behind his settee. It all seemed to sound and feel larger than it was.

And the frost still lingered.

“Never?” Rhodey asked and Tony felt his breath stutter in his chest. Jesus, he remembered having said something similar to Bruce during that post-Killian mess but Bruce had gone to sleep mid-talk, so Tony knew that he hadn’t heard a thing. That had been disappointing as well as a relief. Now though, now he knew that somebody had heard it.

“Uh, not really,” Tony said and shrugged, because shrugging always meant that things were okay, right? Apparently not, because nobody believed his shrugs anymore.

He knew the word. It was a pretty simple word to get out, seven letters of freedom. _Asexual_ , that’s all he had to say. Seven letters and he wouldn’t have to go through a long list of times he had not wanted to do something but had believed that he had to or he would not be secure. Not have the power he did if he went through with it. Sex had been a tool to distract in the beginning. Someone saw parts of you that could make you vulnerable? Talk dirty to them. Someone wanted to pick your brains or manipulate you? Let them manipulate you physically instead. Someone gave you too much and you didn’t know how to give back? Give them pleasure in physical terms. He didn’t believe he was being selfless or anything by doing all of that. It was never that. It was for pure self-preservation and sometimes for very selfish reasons, like holding on to people who were too good for him. All he had to do was put aside one letter of his seven-lettered freedom and go through with the act. It would mean nothing, not really, because he could fake it for a few minutes to have something real for a few hours, right? So he had done it for years, hiding the _A_  from his Asexual. 

Now, it was out in the open. The seventh letter to his truth.

“Me too,” he heard a voice from his side and turned to see Vision smiling serenely at him.

“What?” Tony blinked.

“I have never wanted to indulge in sexual activities as well,” Vision explained and offered Tony a mug of hot chocolate Carol had brought in her weird flask when she had dropped in from her mom’s home, “In the words of Mr. Parker, ‘welcome to the club’, Tony.”

“Wait, how come only club members get hot chocolate, hmm?” Carol protested and Tony looked at her in a daze to see her mock-frowning at Vision, “Tony, tell your son to give us some too. This is unfair.”

“What?” Tony repeated and Carol rolled her eyes fondly before jumping up from her seat and coming over to sit near Tony, nudging him to move with her hip.

“Hot chocolate, genius,” she grabbed the mug from Vision and winked at Tony before taking a sip from it.

“I-uh,” Tony cleared his throat and felt his hand shivering a bit but Carol casually placed her own hand over it and squeezed his fingers, “You guys, um, you guys heard me, right?”

“Yeah, we did,” Rhodey quipped and Tony didn’t look up but felt when Rhodey came over to sit beside him, effectively squishing Tony between Carol and himself, “We definitely heard you, Tones.”

“And-uh, you’re–okay–” Tony shut up, not wanting to ask if they still accepted him, if they still saw him as Tony Stark, if they still -

“Dude, you were my best friend when you ‘accidentally’ poured Jack Daniels all over my dress whites -” Rhodey said as he slung an arm over Tony’s shoulder.

“-and my friend when you stole my tampon box and used it to clean your engine parts once,” Carol chimed in with a snort, throwing her arm over Tony’s shoulder too.

“- and when you kept your palladium thing a secret from me -”

“ - and when you essentially told my squad that I have a scrapbook of dick pics of my COs -”

“ - and when you, you know, became a synthezoid daddy,” Rhodey nodded at Vision with a smirk.

“ - so if you think we’re gonna be weird about _this_  of all the things in the world,” Carol concluded with a squeeze of Tony’s shoulder, “then you’re grossly mistaken.”

“Oh” Tony said, for once in his life falling short of words and Rhodey ruffled his hair slightly, snorting when Tony squacked.

“Yeah, genius,” Rhodey grinned and chuckled when Carol laid an exaggerated kiss to Tony’s cheek that had him fake-gagging, “But honestly? Thanks, man.”

“For what? Not sleeping with you?” Tony asked jokingly and blinked to clear the wetness in his eyes.

“For telling us,” Carol knocked her head lightly against Tony’s and took another sip of hot chocolate, “Don’t be a dumbass.”

“Whatever,” Tony quipped, covering up his relief with humor, “I’m still the hottest ass here.”

“You’re some ass, certainly,” Rhodey snorted and groaned exaggeratedly when Tony batted his eyes at him.

They didn’t talk about the past, about all the times Tony had been uncomfortable with his truth or had hidden it for convenience’s sake. They also didn’t talk about the past relationships that now had a new angle to them. They would, Tony knew it, they would talk about it sometime in the future because it was part of knowing one part of the truth. But he also knew that when they did talk about it, whenever that happened, his friends would listen. And still be there, just as they always had been.

Which is why when Peter finally came and snagged a pizza slice off Tony’s plate with a huff of ‘You’re just aces, Mr. Stark, thanks’, they were able to look at each other and dissolve into snorts and giggles much to the poor teen’s confusion.

Tony did it on a Friday evening, and felt a part of him lighten as he felt the frost melt a bit, with candles of a past memory burning softly in the background, reminding him that sometimes even the quiet held a joy of its own

**Author's Note:**

> Yep, I did it. Feedback please!


End file.
